Television programs, movies, and video games most commonly provide visual stimulation from a television screen display and audio stimulation from the speakers connected to the television. There are some known systems that attempt to enhance a viewer's/user's experience by providing a more interactive/responsive environment. For example, some video gaming systems cause lighting devices such as lamps to generate an ambient light effect (“ALE”) during game play.
To provide an enjoyable interactive experience, the lighting devices need to generate the ambient light effects at appropriate times when the associated scene is displayed to a user. Thus, an ambient light effect-capable system needs to be able to identify one or more scenes during the display of which an ambient light effect is to be generated. One such system focuses on detecting and analyzing various parameters of the video file or video game application and generating ambient light effects based on the detected parameters. One problem with such an approach is that many video files and video games include various access restrictions imposed by the content providers, and such restrictions may make it difficult or impossible to analyze the parameters of a video file and/or video game.
Home automation systems provide networks for controlling various electrical devices such as lighting fixtures, garage door openers, home alarm systems, and the like. Home automation systems are not known to be integrated with electronic devices such as televisions, DVD players, or video game consoles to provide ambient light effects based on scenes or action sequences included in television programs, movies, and video games.
What is needed are systems and methods of producing ambient light effects in association with one or more portions of a video file that overcomes the aforementioned shortcomings.